The darkness flickers with images of her mother, Gaga, Tom; all the things she could have and maybe should have said to him. At the beginning, when she moved to the cottage, things between them had been awkward. He was less used to human company than she was. She was gentle with him, took some time to observe his ways; read when he wanted to stay with her longer, read when he wasn’t in the mood to converse. As the years went by, he would often sit with her and eat a meal she’d cooked. She would spend extra time preparing a special meal on Thursdays in case he had time to stay. Sometimes they sat in complete silence, him in his head, her observing him, trying to pick out all the parts of her that she recognised in him. Sometimes they talked constantly throughout his visit, about nature, about sport, about something she’d read in a magazine or heard on the radio. Despite her being the hidden one, she felt she was the one who provided him with more information about the world. His world was his farm, and while hers was the cottage, she listened to the radio, and she read, so she was always connected to what was happening. She just needed him to bring the batteries. She felt that he liked listening to her talk. Maybe he was picking the parts of himself from her too. He wasn’t someone to laugh easily, he was simple-minded, good-natured, a good listener and a keen observer. They were alike that way. She thinks of the last time she saw him, disappearing through the trees with a wave, Mossie at his heels. He was going to return later to fix her window. It needed sealer. He’d walk around the cottage tapping things, banging things, kicking things. At first she felt he was rude, never able to focus on her, then she realised it was his way of helping her, of showing he cared. For so many years he was all she had and she loved him.
She thinks of Mossie, of Rory and the cheeky smile on his handsome face before he shot that hare. The sound it made as it went down. It was far away, and the gunshot echoed in her ears, but she was sure she heard it. The sound it made as it left the world.
Cruelty.
What is she doing in this world? Where is she going?
She knows that she has so much further to go than the distance she has come. She could always go back. Her bridge is wavering, a rope bridge at best, its fragile supports are close to snapping if they take any more weight. She thinks of Joe, who looked so like Tom she thought it was him. She hears his angry shouts, directed at her, the wrong tone coming from his mouth, and her eyes are forced open. She feels Solomon in her space, imagines that his eyes are on her, feels his body pressed up against hers on the clay pigeon field as he tried to pull her to safety, his strong arms around her waist. Even when he’s not physically touching her, he has that presence in her life. His arm around her waist, pulling her away from danger.
She’s not sure about where she’s going, but she knows she can’t go back.
17
It’s evening by the time Solomon and Laura arrive in Dublin. She still hasn’t spoken a word to him during the entire trip, despite him calling out to her a few times, softly checking to see if she’s okay or if she’d like him to stop the car. He thinks she may be sleeping, because the sounds have stopped. If that’s the case, he learns she makes no sounds in her sleep, and there’s an intimacy in knowing that about her, in even wanting to know that about her. He’s never felt he’s wanted to know so much about a person before. He watches her again in the rear-view mirror and then sighs, and settles into his seat.
Solomon’s apartment is on Grand Canal, a newly developed area among swanky office blocks. Beneath each apartment block is a hive of restaurants and cafés, so that the first summer months Solomon moved in, he sat on the balcony with a beer, listening to the conversations of strangers below his balcony. He used to listen to everything, was interested in everything, then one night when the drink-fuelled arguments began, he was stupid enough to go downstairs and try to intervene. Instead of peace, he received a black eye. Those conversations eventually grew irritating. Nothing that anybody said was of any interest to him: prattle, small-talk, gossip, nagging, awkward first dates, silent settled couples, raucous groups of friends. So he avoided the balcony, or he’d cough loudly, clear his throat, turn up his music to alert them to the fact somebody was above them who could hear.
And then he stopped hearing them. He doesn’t know when it happened, but it occurred to him during the first week that Bo moved in. She couldn’t sleep one night because of the talking outside. Then she couldn’t concentrate on her paperwork during the day because of the noise from the wakeboarding in the water outside. And while he was telling her a story over lunch, he could see she wasn’t listening.
‘Did you hear that?’ she’d gasped, before leaving their breakfast table to go to the balcony where she leaned over and tried to locate the source of the mystery phrase.
He hadn’t noticed it happen, but he’d stopped hearing everything outside. And as far as he knew, the same had since happened to Bo. Things happen like that.
Laura sits up as soon as they enter the city, able to tell the difference in the light, the sound, and in the stop-start of the traffic. She stretches and looks around, and Solomon studies her face, the first time he’s had a clear view of her for hours. If she was sleeping, she doesn’t look like it; she looks wide awake, beautiful, innocently looking from one window to another, taking it all in. She’s never been to a city. The lights and action disappear as they drive into the underground car park below the apartment block.
‘My apartment’s above,’ Solomon explains, as she looks around in confusion.
He slams the car door shut and it reverberates around the echoing underground. Laura jumps, startled. Somebody in the distance throws a trash bag into the communal bin and bangs it closed. It echoes and she jumps again.
Solomon watches her from the corner of his eye, concerned about bringing her here. ‘There’s a hotel on the next block. The Marker. It’s nice. Modern, fancy rooftop bar, you can see the whole city.’ He couldn’t afford to put her up, but perhaps Bo could find the funds. She should be able to for the subject of her documentary. ‘You can stay there, if you like.’
‘No,’ she says quickly. ‘I want to stay with you.’